Comparison of Retinex and iCAM for scene rendering

We begin with a brief review of the basic issues and a range of algorithms related to scene rendering. Then the results of an initial comparison of the McCann99 Retinex and iCAM algorithms for use in rendering three high dynamic range gray-scale images are reported. The images are also rendered using an image-specific manual tone curve. Ten observers performed a rank ordering of the printed renderings, and then mean rankings were computed. The results varied by image, with iCAM being most preferred for one of the images, McCann99 Retinex being most preferred for one of the images, and a tie for all three renderings for the third image. Five relative qualitative trends in the results are also described. (C) 2004 American Institute of Physics.